Rolta, Thales team up

Mumbai, Aug. 17: Rolta India has entered into a joint venture with Thales of France to develop communication and information software systems for defence and domestic security both for India and the overseas markets. To be set up on a capital base of Rs 50 crore, the venture will be 51-per-cent owned by Rolta and the rest by Thales. The joint venture will initially have 50 people, which will be scaled up later.

Growth rate

New Delhi, Aug. 17: NCAER has revised its projections for economic growth to 7.9 per cent for 2006-07 compared with 7.7 per cent made in April due to expected higher growth in the industry and the services sectors.

Oil prices

London, Aug. 17: Crude oil prices today plunged to levels last seen at the end of June, amid signs of an economic slowdown in the US and receding tensions in West Asia. In London, Brent North Sea crude for October delivery stood at $71.70, which was $1.13 less than the previous day's close.

Wheat tender

New Delhi, Aug. 17: MMTC today received three bids from Glencore, Toepfer and MTPL, its Singapore-based wholly-owned subsidiary, in response to its global wheat import tender for over 1 lakh tonnes.

Hutch rating

Singapore, Aug. 17: Buoyed by robust growth expectations for Hutchison Telecommunications International’s Indian subsidiary Hutch Essar, Standard & Poor’s has upgraded its rating on HTIL to 4-stars (buy) from 3-stars (hold).

Tata Tele

Calcutta, Aug. 17: Tata Teleservices, which offers CDMA-based telecom services under the Tata Indicom brand, would invest Rs 110 crore more towards infrastructure development in the Calcutta circle this fiscal, besides infusing Rs 600 crore in the eastern regional circles.

Blue Dart

Mumbai, Aug. 17: The board of Blue Dart Express today approved the proposal made by DHL Express to buy the outstanding publicly-held shares of the company at Rs 550 apiece and delist its shares from the bourses.